


Never Again

by RedKitsune



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Cross-Posted on Tumblr, Date with someone else, F/M, Marriage Proposal, Mutual Pining, OC and Loki are not a couple, Post-Break Up, They broke up a year ago, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, Valentine's Day, failure to move on, past mistakes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-08
Updated: 2019-02-08
Packaged: 2019-10-24 03:33:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,042
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17696861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedKitsune/pseuds/RedKitsune
Summary: Marina had watched Loki walk away from her a year ago. Nine months ago she accepted a date with a perfectly acceptable Greg. One date turned into another and now they were celebrating their first Valentines day as a couple. Has Greg won her heart or had she ever taken it back from Loki in the first place?





	Never Again

**Author's Note:**

> Posted for a Tumblr Challenge by @loki-the-fox with the prompts: “Proposing on Valentine’s Day…how original.”And “What are you doing? Why are you on one knee? Get up! Get up!”

Marina sighed as she ran a bush through her hair, pulling tangles from the golden strands. Maybe if she dyed it she could forget how much he had loved her hair, the way it contrasted so sharply against his. He’d said her hair made him love the color again. It didn’t matter anymore. Or at least that’s what she told herself as she set the brush down and looked at herself in the mirror.

Brown eyes looked back at her. The same brown eyes he had said he loved. He’d told her they reminded him of the earth, always warm. The same eyes he said he would look into every night and every morning. He’d not looked into her brown eyes in almost a year.

“Loki is gone.” Her voice didn’t sound so convincing in her ears. Tears threatened to choke her voice but she pushed them back. “He left and he’s not changing his mind this time.”

She needed to forget about him. She needed to move on. It was valentines day and she had a date with Greg and he’d be here soon. They’d been together for nearly nine months and honestly she hadn’t expected it to last this long. It wasn’t meant to last this long.

You know that thing where you put off doing something painful until it becomes an unconquerable task? When it came to Greg, that’s what she had done. He loved her, she knew he did and at first she thought she had as well.

In reality she had just loved the idea of him. The idea of something normal. But he looked at her like she hung the moon and stars. He was sweet and kind and did everything right. He said all the right things and so she put off breaking his heart for another week. Then another.

Weeks turned into months. Now it was their first Valentine’s day and she was left dreading it even as she smoothed down her dress. It was black with a green sheen to the smooth fabric that clung to her curves. Loki would have loved it. Loki would never get to see it.

Marina pushed the thought away as the doorbell rang through the apartment. It didn’t matter. She wasn’t wearing the dress for Loki. Loki would never see the dress. She wore it for Greg. Greg would say it looked great on her. Greg would have said the same thing if she wore a burlap sack. Loki’s praise would be honest as would be his criticisms of a burlap sack as a dress.

* * *

He sat in the dim light of the restaurant. When they asked if he was waiting on someone he told them he was in a sense and ordered another glass of wine. The moment she walked in his eyes found her. He was torturing himself, he knew that. Yet he couldn’t help coming back over and over again to pour salt on the wound. Why not constantly remind himself what he lost.

The dress she wore was beautiful in its simplicity. God did it hug her, caressed her how he wished he could, how he should. It was green and dark, nearly black but he could see the green under the lights. Still nearly a year later she wore his color.

But it didn’t matter. It wasn’t him with her. He missed his chance. Threw it away as if it meant nothing. It was his single greatest mistake. Even now he relived the day it all went wrong when ever he closed his eyes.

As he watched her walk across the dining room, hand held in that man’s loose grip he could hear the bitter words he had spoken. The words intended to cut deep fueled by nothing more then the jealousy and insecurity he felt when she filled her time with another.

He overreacted. He’d been gone for months at a time. She wasn’t going to sit around and wait for him to come back and not do anything to fill the time. It was too much to ask for her to sit around and wait for him day in and day out. It was too much to ask for her to be waiting for him to come back any day.

Never did he doubt her love for him. Never did he doubt his love for her. Never. Yet when he saw her smiling at that man as they shared a lunch he couldn’t fight that red rage that clouded his eyes. As he screamed his rage at her, she informed him through tears that she was giving him relationship advice. The man was married. It was stupid, that coworker wasn’t even the man she was at this restaurant with and never had he wished he could turn back time more.

It was that red rage that made him say those horrible things. He could still see her tears streaming down her face. He could still hear the pain in them as she asked him if he truly thought so low of her. She begged to know how she had failed him. She was just trying to get by, to survive the time spent waiting for him. So much time was spent waiting for him.

When she told him to leave, he did. God had he prayed that she would stop him but she didn’t. He should have refused to go. He should have grabbed his phone off the table. He should have trusted her. He should have never let her go. He shouldn’t be here.

* * *

Marina smiles at Greg as she takes a seat. Ever the gentleman, he pushes in her chair before taking a seat at the table. Everything about the dinner was perfect. There were roses on the table. The live musicians kept sweet music in the air and the lights were dim enough to make each table feel like it was the only table.

Greg said all the right things. He did all the right things and she laughed at all the jokes. It felt like she was a shell just waiting. Just passing the time. In the end, she knew that was what she was doing. Just passing the time, waiting for her heart to heal so maybe she could move on and give it to the perfectly nice man in front of her giving her what should be a perfect Valentine’s date.

It was the perfect Valentine’s date. Except, it wasn’t perfect. Greg wasn’t Loki.

“Let’s have the cake for dessert?” Greg asked, pulling her eyes to him.

She smiled at him and nodded. “Yeah, that would be lovely.”

It was just the right reaction. It was just what was expected of her. It was the right thing to say. Just because her heart was still too broken to give to him didn’t mean she needed to ruin his Valentine’s day. In time maybe she would be able to stop pretending and give him her heart. Really, it would be better to just end things with him. He didn’t deserve to love someone who was still in love with someone else.

The cake came out and the smell of rich chocolate filled the air. A candy rose was draped over the slice. The talent to make such a thing out of pure sugar was impressive. Also impressive was the ring hooked on stem.

“Greg?” What the hell?

He snagged the ring off the stem of the flower as he stood from his chair. Walking around the side of the table with a soft smile on his face.

What the hell? What the hell was going on? No. No. No, no, no.

“Marina,” he spoke as he sank down in front of her on one knee. People around them stopped talking and more and more eyes gathered to take in the sight.

“What are you doing? Why are you on one knee? Get up! Get up!” Panic was bubbling up within her as she stood from her seat. This couldn’t happen. This can’t be happening. This wasn’t right. This wasn’t the right man. This was wrong. So very wrong.

“I love you. I love you more then life itself. I’ve loved you since-” A voice cut him off.

“Proposing on Valentine’s Day…how original.”

The voice that cut him of made her panicked heart stop dead in her chest. It was a voice she hadn’t heard outside of her dreams in a year. It was a voice she didn’t think she would ever hear again.

“Loki?” She could just see him sitting in the dim light a table away, glass of wine tilted toward her in a mock toast. How had she not noticed him? Why that was simple, he was a bit off to the side, a bit out of her line of sight. So close and yet so far away. “What are you doing here?”

“Mar?” Greg tried to draw her attention back to him as he knelt still on the ground in front of her.

“Drinking wine and watching the best thing I ever had pick someone else.” Loki sipped his wine and her heart shattered.

“I don’t want someone else.”

Greg swallows the bile that rises in his throat as he stands. Her words cut him but he’d always suspected it. This was Loki. The Loki. He’d never had her heart though he had tried time and time again to win it.

“Greg, I-”

Holding his hand up in an effort to silence her, he spoke. “Never mind. You need to figure out what is going on in your heart. I get it. I’ll go settle the bill and be out of your hair.”

She watched dumbly as he left. Did he just dump her? He did, didn’t he?

“Better go chase him.” Loki remarked as he drained the last of the wine from his glass.

“Why?” Tears threatened to spill down her face.

“Because you love him.”

“I don’t. I tired but I never could. It was always you and I wish it wasn’t that way. You hurt me. It’s dumb that I still love you but I do.” The tears were falling now, making a mess of her makeup.

“You still love me?” Loki stood at that and she just nodded forcefully as a storm of emotions raged within her. Her heart was broken and sadness and anger stormed within her heart.

She was startled when Loki came to stand in front of her. With a soft touch he wiped the tears from her face only to watch as more fell. As much as she didn’t want to, she leaned into his touch. His touch felt like home.

“You still love me.” He repeated, sounding mesmerized by the fact.

“You never came back.” She hiccuped and it wasn’t the cutest sound in her own ears but Loki smiled.

“I should have. I thought you didn’t want me.” He admitted as he reached out to her like he sound have done so many months ago.

“You should have.” She agreed but didn’t step away as his arms snaked around her, pulling her to his chest.

That did it. That broke down every wall she had worked so hard to build and she sobbed into his chest, clutching the lapels of his suit jacket as if they would somehow ground her. They were deep ugly sobs that left her gasping for breath as she clung to him. God did he smell good. It felt good to feel him under her hands, to feel his arms around her. It felt right. It felt safe.

“Don’t ever leave me alone again.” It was too much to ask but she couldn’t help it. This couldn’t work if he was going to be gone for months at a time. She was asking for far too much. He was here now, but he would leave her again in time. No matter how much she loved him, it was never enough to keep him from having to return to Asgard.

“You’ll come with from now on.” He promised as he held her just that much tighter. Never again would he let her go. Never again would he leave her behind. Never again would he loose her. Never again.


End file.
